Showing posts with label Etsy. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Etsy. Show all posts

Wednesday, August 01, 2012

Etsy CEO Chad Dickerson: Press Up To Go Down

Etsy was quite small by today’s measures — the community sold $7.93 million of goods in that September, my first month at Etsy. We had about 50 employees and we were in an office in downtown Brooklyn with a broken elevator that famously had a sign that read, “You gotta press up to go down.” ........... four years later .. We have different offices near the Brooklyn Bridge, a working elevator, almost 300 employees, and last month alone, the community sold about $65 million in goods ......... We believe, more than ever, that Etsy can help fundamentally change the way the world works by making it possible for individuals to make and sell things to other people around the globe — a people-powered economy ........ Decades of an unyielding focus on economic growth and a corporate mentality has left us ever more disconnected with nature, our communities, and the people and processes behind the objects in our lives. We think this is unethical, unsustainable, and unfun. However, with the rise of small businesses around the world we feel hope and see real opportunities: Opportunities for us to measure success in new ways… to build local, living economies, and most importantly, to help create a more permanent future. .............. although we’ve been at it for seven years, it feels like we are just getting started. .... After a lot of discussion about what kind of company we are and aspired to be, the team defined these core values for the company:
We are a mindful, transparent, and humane business.
We plan and build for the long term.
We value craftsmanship in all we make.
We believe fun should be part of everything we do.
We keep it real, always.
We want the company to last for a very long time and clearly stand for something in the world. ...... When you support a B Corporation, you’re supporting a better way to do business. Governments and nonprofits are necessary but insufficient to solve today’s most pressing problems. Business is the most powerful force on the planet and can be a positive instrument for change. ....... There are over 500 certified B Corps but Etsy will be among the biggest, along with mission-driven companies like Patagonia and Seventh Generation. ...... becoming a Certified B Corporation is one of the most important things Etsy has ever done. It helps us keep an eye on the “mindful, transparent, and humane” values we aspire to ....... Last year, over $525 million (525 with 6 more zeroes) changed hands among people on Etsy, and worldwide GDP was over $60 trillion dollars (that’s 600 with eleven more zeros). ....... Etsy has closed $40 million of funding from a roster of investors who have been believers in Etsy for a long time. ...... we plan to grow Etsy into an economic force all around the world and we want to provide more products and services to help sellers succeed and build their businesses on the Etsy platform. ...... Every day when I walk to our offices in Brooklyn, I walk past the spot where in 1855 the printers Andrew and James Rome typeset and printed the first edition of Leaves of Grass by great American poet Walt Whitman. ..... exactly 150 years later, barely three-quarters of a mile away, Rob, Chris, Haim, and Jared were doing the the 21st century equivalent of typesetting in coding the original version of Etsy.com.
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Etsy CEO Chad Dickerson On AVC

Image representing Chad Dickerson as depicted ...
Image by John Herren via CrunchBase

These guest posts are very impressive.

MBA Mondays: Guest Post From Chad Dickerson
recruiting and culture are yin and yang .... A great head of HR is critically important but culture and recruiting are owned by everyone if they are successful. ..... I will drop nearly anything I am doing to help close a key candidate. ...... "If you want to build a ship, don't drum up the men to gather wood, divide the work and give orders. Instead, teach them to yearn for the vast and endless sea." ...... the forms of communication available today mean that you can communicate the mission and vision of your company more broadly and directly than ever, which is what I did when I blogged in May about our long-term vision for Etsy. It has never been easier to tell your own story and talk about your company directly with the people you want to reach ....... you should always keep a direct channel open ..... communicating directly gives candidates a deeper sense of what your company is trying to do and they come into the process knowing what your company is all about, often self-selecting to your mission. I've found that this takes the recruiting process up a level. ....... performance metrics rise and fall, valuations go up and down, and stock prices fluctuate. Culture and values persist. ..... we at Etsy have been publishing key metrics from the Etsy marketplace in a monthly "weather report." ..... rigorous values and responsible practices ..... Diversity is one area for improvement, and we're actively and transparently working to improve our score ..... the truly great candidates can take a long time ...... In early 2010, we launched our engineering blog and named it Code as Craft, tying the mission of engineering back to the larger culture of craftsmanship in the Etsy community. ....... "If your culture isn't explicitly leaky, if it doesn't aspire to change the world beyond the walls of your business, if it isn't captured in the product you're building and your users' experience, then it probably isn't culture, it's just cheerleading and team spirit burning up expensive inputs of time and company outings. Culture is lived, and it's why generosity of spirit is such a key piece of our team culture" ........ "Management by objectives tells a manager what he ought to do. The proper organization of his job enables him to do it. But it is the spirit of the organization that determines whether he will do it. It is the spirit that motivates, that calls upon a man's reserves of dedication and effort, that decides whether he will give his best or do just enough to get by." ....... It's hard to quantify this spirit, but you know it when you've got it, and you know how painful it is when you don't. ..... a leader is mostly responsible for tending to the spirit of the organization, and for making whatever adjustments need to be made to keep that spirit strong and powerful. In the end, that spirit matters more than anything.
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Friday, February 18, 2011

Dumbo And Union Square

Location of Manhattan on New York City.Image via WikipediaI am headed to Union Square Friday afternoon to spend a few hours with the PaperlessPost team and its fearless leader Alexa Herschfeld. I had a voice mail from her Wednesday and Google Voice had transcribed her name as Celexa Ourselves. Not good, Google Voice, not good.

And to me it is feeling like I am headed to Dumbo. Dumbo and Union Square are two places in town that have tech clusters. There are a whole bunch of tech startups congregated in those two locales.

If there are other such clusters in the city, I am not aware of them as of yet. I am surprised there are not similar clusters in Williamsburg and Chinatown. I know of at least one major tech company that is based out of Chinatown, but I don't think you would call that a cluster.

Sunday, January 30, 2011

Union Square Ventures: You Love Me, You Love Me Not


Image representing Etsy as depicted in CrunchBaseImage via CrunchBase
Image representing Twitter as depicted in Crun...Image via CrunchBaseUnion Square Ventures has an impressive portfolio. If you are fascinated by web tech like I am, you would be impressed by what they got. They are into Twitter, FourSquare, Zynga. USV constantly looks for companies that will perhaps come up with the next big thing in tech.

With my FinTech startup, I have made it absolutely clear we are not trying to come up with the next big thing in tech. We are not a web tech startup. Instead we will constantly be surveying the scene for new developments in tech to see what we can put to the service of microfinance.

That would be a good reason for USV to not come for us.

Sunday, October 31, 2010

Digital Dumbo 21


"Can I come in?" I opened the door slightly and said.

"You are the first person to show. Come in," said organizer Kaitlin Villanova from across the hall.

Friday, April 16, 2010

Managing Al, Brad, Fred: An Opportunity To Jump For

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"I am interested in understanding why you chose the title General Manager. It does not seem that you need one person to manage the small and largely self-motivated team." 

Union Square Ventures: We Are Hiring "we have envisioned an Investment Analyst and a General Manager of the Union Square Ventures Network"

Albert Wenger, Brad Burnham (@BradUSV) (Tumblr), Fred Wilson.

Fred Wilson: Talent Overload

Fred Wilson and USV first put out a post weeks back saying Farewell Andrew Parker, or something along those lines. And someone commented, in all earnesty, who died? He did not say who died, he said I came over here huffing and puffing hoping noone had died or anything like that. Oh no, Andrew is thankfully alive and well, Fred had to respond.

And now this even more earnest comment on the management position. These two comments have so far stood out as the hiring process rolls on at USV.

Albert Wenger
Brad Burnham
Fred Wilson

Andrew Parker
Dorsey Stinson
Eric Friedman

USV Investments
  1. 10gen
  2. Adaptive Blue
  3. AMEE
  4. Boxee
  5. Bug Labs
  6. Clickable
  7. Covestor
  8. Disqus
  9. Etsy
  10. Foursquare
  11. Heyzap
  12. Indeed
  13. InfoNgen
  14. Meetup
  15. Oddcast
  16. Outside.in
  17. Pinch Media
  18. Return Path
  19. Simulmedia
  20. Targetspot
  21. Tracked
  22. Tumblr
  23. Twitter
  24. Wesabe
  25. Zemanta
  26. Zynga
The USV Focus
Union Square Ventures Job Opening: I Am Applying
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